Due to the limited reserves of fossil fuels and worries about emission of greenhouse gases there is an increasing focus on using renewable energy sources.
Production of fermentation products from cellulose, hemicelluloses, lignocelluloses and polysaccharide containing residue materials is known in the art and includes pre-treating followed by, enzymatic hydrolysis, weak acid hydrolysis, strong acid hydrolysis, and supercritical water hydrolysis to generate fermentable residue materials. Acid hydrolysis has the potential to generate toxic compounds that can reduce or inhibit fermentation in addition to the consumption of substantial amounts of acid at a significant cost. Enzymatic hydrolysis reaction rates can be long as well as sensitive to foreign materials in the target residue, and the cost of enzymes can be expensive. Supercritical water hydrolysis requires capital cost intensive very high temperatures and pressures (>374 C and 22.1 Mpa) to achieve usable break down products. Acid hydrolysis, enzymatic hydrolysis and high pressure supercritical water hydrolysis are challenging methodologies for generating valuable fuels and chemicals from residue biomass. Consequently, there is a need for providing further methods and processes for producing fermentable glucose and glucose derivative products from residue materials using a time reduced system free of acid pretreatment, enzyme technology or very high pressure and temperatures to break down the cellulose linkage.